Tag: relaxation

I’ve found through Balanced View that we ‘learn’ to be in the right setting i.e we learn to listen to the free audios, read all the free books, participate in all the current BV activities. I can now choose to set aside all the thousands of tapes and and books and lectures on psychology and meditations etc that I have been part of my life for more than half a century. I have drawers and cupboards full of such things.

I have taught meditation classes for years and have been involved in countless spiritual activities, seen many spiritual teachers who I have followed for years, and now this simple straight forward teaching emerges, I just live more simply, take short moments and relax. This last I have always given lip service to but suddenly I realised what is truly meant.

We have to seize the power of the mind, no hang ups any more, and then one lives without tension and all that arises from short moments. Great! Short moments have helped me immensely. I can now be relaxed instead of being impatient or angry in situations where I would otherwise have “blown my top.” So simple, yet suddenly even though I’ve heard it over and over again I suddenly ‘get it’.

For most of my life, it seemed obvious that the goal was to find those handful of special people who “got me”, love and interact only with them, and to hell with anyone else. As a child, I had one best friend at a time, and a few other second-bests to call on if my bestie wasn’t available. One by one, those best friends and second-bests drifted away, and the urge to find a special someone who appreciated and knew me inside and out—and would never leave—carried into my adulthood.

After a couple of tumultuous longterm relationships, including a marriage, I decided the other extreme was true: I didn’t want to be in a relationship at all or invest any energy or care into others. If we drifted, cool. If we kept hanging out, cool. It felt freeing after a life of thinking I needed someone else to be complete, though that also missed the real mark.

Then I met my current partner, who I have been with for 7 beautiful years now. The second or so time we hung out, I remember telling him I didn’t want to be in a relationship with anyone; just wanted to meet people and have fun. But something about him was unlike anyone I had met. He really looked me in the eye, he dressed comfortably and confidently, he was relaxed and open in a way I’d never experienced someone be. Things organically progressed, and a year or so into our relationship, he started sharing videos from Balanced View with me.

Through Balanced View, I was introduced to so many people who had the same radiant, authentic relaxation my partner had. It was magnetizing, even with initial fears of the unknown. After joining a number of clarity calls and participating in trainings, I connected with people I knew from those offerings over Facebook and email, experiencing that same open relaxation in them even though we were just exchanging digital letters and images on a screen. I could honestly say I loved people I had never met in the flesh.

Eventually my partner and I started attending in-person Balanced View gatherings in California and Sweden. Being with so many relaxed, open-hearted beings in one place was an incredible—sometimes overwhelming in the beginning—experience. I found and still find myself falling in love again and again with so many amazing friends and mentors who show me what is possible; what it is to be truly themselves without any bullshit or fronts. A falling in love that is very ordinary where I am not afraid of it fading or ceasing, or that it has to look a certain way. Seeing that true love subsumes all the ideas I held about it; that it’s already the case between us—as us—as human beings. Not elusive, or something that only a special few can hold with me like my intimate partner, family members, or friends I see regularly face-to-face. Wow!

More and more, I find myself feeling love for and connecting with people I don’t conventionally know at all. Fast food clerks that take my order, someone who I help pick up groceries they dropped on the street, a tourist asking me for directions in my home city.. Sometimes I’m struck at the heart to speak with others and recognize our inherent connection, whatever we’re talking about or however many or few words we exchange.

If who I’m talking to isn’t outwardly pleasant or open, uncontrived compassion is more and more obvious. Through the incredible encouragement and support from Balanced View over the years to not run away from my own afflictive thoughts and emotions, it isn’t a mystery to me anymore how someone could act out from the data they experience. I did for the majority of my life, unaware of another option. If someone is rude or awkward, I’m no longer fooled into thinking there is something fundamentally wrong with them or me, and can more spontaneously see what is helpful and what isn’t in any given situation.

There is something astounding and powerful about speaking openly to another human being with no strings attached on either side. Not needing each other to change in order to feel okay, and everyone taking full responsibility for their own thoughts, emotions, and actions without dumping them absentmindedly onto others. I get this in spades through my interactions with participants in the Balanced View community, and evermore naturally with anyone in life.

I’m eternally grateful for this opening to love as it actually is. Thank you all, love you all.

Dear friend,
Thank you for taking the time to read this post.
As I write this I am sitting in a street cafe in busy, dirty, noisy night time Delhi, on my way back from two months at the Balanced View Center in Goa. What I wanted to share is the difference I see in how stable and safe I feel in so many different settings. I easily used to feel anxious, unsafe and even afraid when traveling in the East; whenever it got too dirty or exotic I felt somehow threatened and like I couldn’t relax. I remember many sleepless, anxious nights on the road and the contrasting relief that wouldn’t arise until I was safe back in my apartment in Stockholm. This was fine, but I remember wishing that I possessed a stability that wasn’t tied to a place or a person. Now that I am here, upon reflection it is beautiful to see that I can relax and feel at home in this chaotic place. I think it is because more and more I feel at home, content and familiar with my internal data. It’s like I bring home with me wherever I am, home is always what is looking, completely at rest and at ease no matter what appears within or outside. This is so soothing and so freeing! I don’t feel afraid of foreign people or foreign places because I have harmonized the relationship with so many of the thoughts and emotions that I used to take as alien or hostile. Gratitude to the brilliant, custom made support of Balanced View’s empowerment network the Four Mainstays that come with me to all corners of the world, for opening this up and allowing me to realize I am always at home in open intelligence!
Love, Beate

I am so immensely grateful for the wonderful trust of the Four Mainstays empowerment network of Balanced View.
To have the wonderful tools of short moments in midst of disturbing states, to completely relax and leave every thing as it is, this is so very empowering and soothing!!
Having a Trainer and Root Trainer, Community, and participate in trainings, this is the complete trust and guiding light of light!!! Since I have relied on the Four Mainstays my relationship to my children and wife have become so close and beautiful.
As a father I can see that I can be of great support, which I did not believe I could be before, and it is so much easier to relate in a natural and easeful way with all people!!
My life is so filled with clarity and love, and it is so obvious how stable and powerful I am in my everyday life!!!
With gratitude Per

When I met the Balanced View Teaching, I was in my fourth year of learning a bodywork/energy art which was intended to bring about healing through relaxation and balance. I had a three year diploma already, and was offering this service to the public.

It’s amazing to reflect and see clearly how much I could not even enjoy giving this service, as I could not relax with my own data (thoughts, emotions and sensations), let alone help someone else relax with theirs. I was in a constant argument in my mind, because my thoughts were always so negative and my response was to struggle with them, to try to make them positive or make them go away. This resulted in a lot of tension!

The first time I listened to a talk by Candice, the founder of Balanced View, I experienced my first moment of complete relaxation. I remember it so distinctly because it was complete relief for my mind and body. It was what I had been striving to experience, in all the practices, attempts to rest and all the therapy sessions.

When I went to my first Balanced View Open Meeting, I was given the tool of a short moment. I remember this so distinctly also, because for the first time, I was shown what about me is powerful, clear, alert and can always be relied upon.

This experience was so profound, I kept on coming back. After a short amount of time, I gave up the bodywork practice because I could see what I really wanted for myself and others was being offered so completely by the Balanced View Teaching.

Complete relaxation was impossible before receiving education in the nature of mind because no matter what I did to relax, I was always so busy in my mind. The practice of the Balanced View Teaching has shown me deeply and profoundly that I can let all my data be as it is, no matter how wrong it might seem. I’ve been shown undoubtedly that everything I experience is open intelligence, my power to benefit all.

Seven years later, I can face all circumstances, I can enjoy everything about life, I can contribute benefit no matter what I am experiencing because I can relax and let the beneficial energy of data self-release and empower my qualities and activities. All I need to do is completely relax for a short moment. A short moment of knowing that everything I experience is open intelligence.

It is the greatest blessing, the most wonderful way to live life, giving so much in all ways we wish for as human beings. I cannot thank Candice and Balanced View enough. Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!

The other day, I suddenly felt overwhelmed by negative data (emotions and thoughts). I went to my bedroom because I knew I was going to cry. I simply put on a talk by the founder of Balanced View, Candice O’Denver. Her soothing words, which illicit the recognition of open intelligence, reminded me to take a short moment. I saw that everything was okay; I could just let the data flow on by. One short moment and I was able to go downstairs and spend time with friends, laughing and enjoying with them. This is a miracle!